Even with it getting colder (well... cold for Queensland!) and being outside of the school holidays it was really tough to find a campground that met my requirements for a good night away, namely a toilet (I know right?!), firepit with a bag of wood and fishing. Bushywood at Woodfordskilake fits the bill and this was to be a return trip for me as this was the first place I ever motocamped.
After an excellent sesion Bass fishing up at Enoggera Reservoir in the morning I headed home, loaded up the bike and got on the road. The route is amazing, through Samford Village, onto Dayboro then up over the hills to woodford via Mnt Mee. One day I really want to do the trip offroad traveling through the forest but I'll save that for when I've a bit more confidence!
I got to Woodford around 4ish, headed to the campsite and dumped the gear before returning to the Woolies in town to get supplies for the evening. The plan was to do a steak and mushrooms on the new camping grill I'd picked up so a quick stomp around the supermarket and a trip to the bottle shop for some beers and I was back at my spot by the lake just in time to see the moon rise.
It was completely unplanned but my trip coincided with a full moon (maybe thats why the fishing had been so good earlier in the day?!) and it was stunning to see it rise behind the waterskiing lake. With the tent up and the bike sorted out, the only thing left was to get the fire going. Bushy had supplied a big bag of wood for $20 and my spot overlooking the lake had a perfect firepit ring already set up. I'd scanned the area before leaving for the shops and it looked like previous campers had nabbed all the pine cones... Luckily for me I'd spotted a heap of them on the driveway so I had 10 or so in my pannier.
Pine cones make the most amazing fire starters and in no time I had a decent blaze going. So I grabbed a beer, sat back in my camping chair and watched the moon gracefully travel up into the sky. Not bad, not bad at all.
After a couple of hours of constantly feeding the fire I had a good pile of glowing coles so it was time to break out the camping grill. I've been hunting for something to cook over the fire with for a while now as part of the motocamping experience for me is eating well. Noodles, pasta, tuna fish innacan all have their place but if I'm going to spend a night under the stars, I'd rather having something tasty and less carby! After investigating various different options I found a foldable camping grill on Amazon and decided to give it a go. It has two different levels and I decided to use the lower level, positioning it near to the fire and raking hot coles underneath.
Steak on and sizzling away, there was just enough room to fit a large mushroom on the side of the grill - it was looking good! As I wasn't entirely sure of the heat coming off the coles I gave it a couple of minutes each side and then sliced a corner off to check the 'doneness' and as it was looking bang on, I tore off a bit of turkish bread, popped the steak in between and... It was perfect, probably one of the best steaks I'd had in a long long time!
So the evening was spent working my way through steak, a couple of beers and a movie under the stars. It was chilly but I'd built the fire up to a good size and that kept me warm until around midnight when I decided to call it a night.
Even though its winter the sun was up by 5.30 and as my spot wasn't in the shade I was up and about early to investigate the fishing options. From what I've been told, there are plenty of tilapia in the lake and I'd come armed with corn and bread to target them. But it was quickly apparent that the weed had really come up since my last visit and after an hour or so of being wiped out I decided to give it a miss. There are two types of weed in the lake, one if which is the brown floating stuff and as the wind got up it was just moving back and forth up the lake making fishing virtually impossible...
I had a shower, packed down around 10ish and got back on the road home. Another fantastic night under the stars, the camping grill had worked a treat, all my gear had performed perfectly and I guess the only down point was the lack of fishing - but having caught loads of bass up at Enoggera in the morning, I wasn't grumbling!